


our hearts can tell

by xin_yurui



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Childhood Friends, Learn to love and lose, Lee Donghyuck | Haechan-centric, M/M, Multiple Relationships, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-26
Updated: 2020-11-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:28:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27728125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xin_yurui/pseuds/xin_yurui
Summary: At age six, it's Wong Yukhei. At age eleven, Na Jaemin.And he keeps running, Donghyuck does -- running far, jumping high, falling fast, but --Somehow in the end, it's always Mark Lee, Mark Lee, Mark Lee.
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee
Comments: 20
Kudos: 110





	our hearts can tell

**Author's Note:**

> instead of wearing my heart on my sleeve,  
> i pasted it onto paper  
> and pressed print.
> 
> here.  
> take it.  
> it is not mine anymore.
> 
> \-- Kaufman

Donghyuck has never been one to get attached. A stubborn child, refusing to pick up his clothes as per his mother’s call because she didn’t let him have an extra slice of cake at his fifth birthday three months ago, pulling “I’m sorry’s” and “thank you’s” from his mouth as if his teeth were getting yanked out one by one with every syllable in excruciating pain, strong-willed to the point that his neighbors politely tell him with funny expressions on their faces that he’d make a great lawyer one day. 

Donghyuck is tough to get along with, and it shows in the way he and Mark clash over every little thing. Donghyuck calling Mark’s braces ugly, Mark retorting that Donghyuck was short and even uglier, Donghyuck then saying he’d never talk to Mark again. They roll around and crash into each other and then fly apart, sparks bouncing -- and it’s a continuity, something that doesn’t change.

Donghyuck has never been one to get attached and yet, the first time he met Wong Yukhei, he knew he liked him from the start. Yukhei was a tall boy for his age, gangly long limbs flailing all over the place and perpetually in motion, whether it be him dribbling a worn vulcanized rubber basketball or pushing at Donghyuck with laughter in his eyes or bouncing his legs furiously during class. Yukhei was loud, too, something that complemented Donghyuck’s boisterity and gave him a worthy video game partner when the two of them sat legs splayed on the carpet at Yukhei’s house mashing the buttons on the controller desperately. 

Donghyuck meets Yukhei one sunny afternoon behind his neighbor’s pool (where Donghyuck definitely wasn’t supposed to be, given that his neighbor and him didn’t exactly click together), popsicle in hand and dripping sticky purple juice down Donghyuck’s six year old wrists. He had originally planned to dig up some of the red clay behind the pool and take it home to see if he could make sculptures out of it, but he abandons that plan at once upon seeing the three perfect clay cats being mounded and shaped by a boy who couldn’t possibly be much older than him.

Fascinated, Donghyuck drops the handfuls of dirt he holds and sticks the popsicle in his mouth, making his way cautiously towards the boy as quietly as his worn out tennis shoes will let him. The boy looks up, and a puppy smile spreads across his face, eyes shining and full of excitement.

“Hi! Do you want to play?”

Donghyuck almost gasps at his face, because even at the young age that the boy is, his features are so prominently defined and masculine he looks as if he could be a child model. Donghyuck tries not to think about his own chubby cheeks and dirt smeared beneath his chin as he makes his way towards the boy, takes the popsicle from his mouth and breathes, “Can you teach me?” And the boy, if possible, smiles even wider. 

“Of course!” he says happily and clears the dirt on the ground beside him and Donghyuck plops down, legs crossed and peering eagerly over the boy’s shoulder. “I’m Donghyuck, by the way,” he says, and the boy’s eyes crinkle into crescents. 

“I’m Yukhei,” he says, and the rest is history.

  
  
  
  
  
  


Yukhei is a grade above Donghyuck and to Donghyuck’s immense disappointment, shares different interests. Where Donghyuck somehow makes his way to the top of his class and is forced by his mother to join various academical extracurriculars, Yukhei stays in the average band and spends his time on the soccer fields and basketball courts. They always reconvene, though, at the end of the day, to skip to Yukhei’s house because Yukhei is the one with the non-glitching controllers. 

“Yukhei,” Donghyuck starts suddenly one day, when both of them are laying belly face up on the grass outside Donghyuck’s house, tracing patterns into the aquamarine sky and cotton clouds, “Teach me how to play basketball.”

Yukhei sits up, puzzled. “I thought you didn’t like playing sports?”

Donghyuck shrugs and sits up too. He doesn’t like basketball, doesn’t like sports in general, but he figures if he learns to play basketball and somehow makes it onto the team, he could spend more time with Yukhei. “Well, I wanna learn.”

Yukhei’s eyes brighten, and he bounces to his feet. “It’s not hard. You see, here’s the ball…”

Donghyuck learns that he isn’t good at playing basketball. The ball almost seems to go backwards every time it leaves his hands, and it doesn’t help that Mark knows Yukhei and teases Donghyuck for missing the net for the hundredth time. In fact, Donghyuck is so bad at basketball that soon even Yukhei, with his infinite amounts of patience, eventually gently takes the ball from Donghyuck’s hands.

(It’s fine, it’s not like Donghyuck’s trying his best or anything.)

Donghyuck makes an attempt to grab the ball, but even at nine years of age Yukhei towers over him. “Can we try it again tomorrow?” He asks, hopeful and staring up at Yukhei, whose face immediately breaks out into a smile, ever kind. “Of course,” he replies, and they set the basketball down on the court and walk to the nearest minimarket to get ice cream. 

  
  
  
  
  
  


Yukhei finally places into Donghyuck’s maths class when Donghyuck is in fourth grade, and the two of them spend the days passing notes to each other much to his mother’s disapproval. The fan drones awfully in the back of the room, and the heat of the approaching summer is oppressing. Yukhei grows even taller, his features mature even more, and before long there’s girls coming up to him at recess asking if he wants to sit beside them during lunch. Donghyuck watches the scene unfold with an ugly twisting thing in his stomach before he stands up and marches towards the small crowd, pushing past Yeri and Yeojin and Chaeyoung to reach a bewildered but ever-smiling Yukhei in the center.

“Stop it,” he announces, “he doesn’t like any of you.” Yukhei’s face falls a little at that, almost imperceptible, but he lets himself be pulled by Donghyuck to the swings. Donghyuck’s hand in Yukhei’s feels sweaty and hot, and he’s sure he’s flushed. When he turns back around, Yukhei is staring at him with a confused look on his face.

“They didn’t mean anything,” he says, “They just wanted to see if they could eat lunch with us.”

Donghyuck rolls his eyes, letting go of Yukhei’s hand. He brushes his palms against his pants to get rid of the sweat and says, “They didn’t want to eat lunch with us. They wanted to eat lunch with  _ you _ .”

Yukhei still looks confused. “I don’t see what’s wrong?”

Donghyuck rolls his eyes again. “They’re flirting with you,” he informs Yukhei with a serious look on his face. “They’re flirting with you and they like you. Like,  _ like _ like you.” Yukhei doesn’t look convinced, so Donghyuck presses forwards with big eyes. “You don’t want to spend time with them and forget about me, do you?” And Yukhei backtracks with a horrified expression, waving his hands wildly in the air and sputtering.

“No, of course not!” He insists. “I wouldn’t want to spend time with anyone except for you, Donghyuck.” He thinks for a moment, thoughtfully. “And maybe Mark.” At Donghyuck’s disgruntled face, he laughs and grabs Donghyuck’s head, mussing up his hair. “He’s not that bad, Donghyuck, I think you’re the only one who doesn’t like him even though you’ve known each other for so long.”

Donghyuck ducks out from Yukhei’s grip, and crosses his arms resolutely. “I don’t not like him,” he mutters, “He’s just... _ awkward _ .” 

Yukhei laughs again and pulls Donghyuck down onto the grass with him, pointing up to the sky “See that cloud? It looks like a sea snail.”

“You don’t even know what a sea snail looks like, dummy.”

  
  
  
  
  


When Yukhei graduates, Donghyuck cries. He wipes at his eyes furiously and hiccups and denies the tears falling down his cheeks, and watches as Yukhei marches proudly across the stage in his gown and receives his certificate with a wide grin. When a girl next to him starts crying after Yukhei disappears from sight, Donghyuck stiffens resolutely and abruptly quells his tears. 

He spends the summer staring at the photos of him and Yukhei, arms thrown over each other’s shoulders, laughter on their faces. He stares and stares at the pictures until Mark hides them beneath his refrigerator.

  
  
  
  
  


After Yukhei moves to middle school, Donghyuck finally learns to play basketball, as per Mark’s instruction. He’s determined to learn, this time not because Yukhei knew how -- but because he refuses to admit he can’t learn how to do something. Even if the sports gene isn’t in his blood, he still makes some pretty decent shots while Mark cheers from the sidelines (Mark doesn’t play with Donghyuck because Mark could thrash Donghyuck easily and Donghyuck would like to be spared the humiliation).

Nevertheless, Donghyuck learns to play and while he’s not amazing, it’s something.

  
  
  
  
  


Donghyuck meets Jaemin in middle school. Jaemin is popular, a playboy, somebody everybody wants to know and get close with. Jaemin is pretty faced, well-versed, unique, and Donghyuck falls over him immediately. 

It happens one day when Donghyuck sits in the rows behind Jaemin and is at a perfect angle, the perfect angle so he can see Jaemin’s profile, the slope of his nose, the angle of his jaw, and Jaemin turns around and gives Donghyuck a curious look. Donghyuck looks away quickly, face flaming and scribbles furiously in his notebook and hopes Jaemin will look somewhere else, anywhere but him. When he feels brave enough to look up again, Jaemin is still staring at him with a peculiar look in his eyes. Donghyuck rips his eyes down to his notebook again, tips of his ears red and a flush traveling down his neck.

When the bell rings, Donghyuck slings his bag over his shoulder and bolts from the classroom, down the hallways and into the parking lots where he hops impatiently on the balls of his feet, waiting for the large buses to pull into the square. 

When a hand claps him on the shoulder, he squeaks and jumps, whipping around so fast his neck cracks. Mark grins at him, braces on full display as he swings Donghyuck around.

“Mom asked me to invite you over for dinner tonight,” he says, spitting all over Donghyuck’s face. “She wants you to tutor me in maths.”

Donghyuck appraises him slowly at first, then brings a hand up to wipe the spit off his face. Mark Lee is not Na Jaemin, he concludes while still appraising Mark slowly, observing the piece of chicken stuck between his front two wires.

“Sure.” He offers dryly, and so he follows Mark Lee home.

  
  
  
  


From what he remembers, Mark has always been a constant in his life. Whether it be at Donghyuck’s fifth birthday party, to which Mark was invited to only because his mother made him invite him, or at the playground where Mark would make fun of Donghyuck being younger and shorter than him and therefore he wasn’t worthy to use the swings first, or in middle school maths class where Donghyuck and Mark compete in a frenzy to get the highest test scores. Mark has always been a constant in Donghyuck’s life, and even in seventh grade this remains a truth.

Na Jaemin moves up to seventh grade with Donghyuck, places into the same classes, and Donghyuck spends his time staring at the back of Jaemin’s head and admiring the two small piercings in his left ear, just two inconspicuous crystals, something his own mother would never let him get. Jaemin, despite being popular, a playboy, someone everybody wanted to know, is also smart and (to Donghyuck’s enormous delight) places in Lim seonsaengnim’s elite maths class. Due to some fateful intervention, Lim seonsaengnim pairs Donghyuck and Jaemin up for a partner project and Donghyuck rests his head on the cool surface of the desk, face turned towards the window so Jaemin can’t catch his smile.

When the bell rings, Jaemin taps Donghyuck lightly on the shoulder.

“Do you want to get started on it today?” 

Donghyuck lifts his head from the table hurriedly. His eyes travels up Jaemin’s shoes to his face, eyes drawn to the perfect slope of his nose and his doe eyes and he almost forgets to speak, just staring at Jaemin with wide wide eyes until Jaemin softly clears his throat and Donghyuck flushes red in embarrassment.

“Yeah, of course,” he stutters out, and Jaemin’s eyes crinkle into a smile and Donghyuck thinks he falls a little bit more. 

That day, Donghyuck refrains from skipping home with Jaemin in tow, bags full of maths papers and heart full of happiness -- and so Donghyuck gets to know Na Jaemin.

  
  
  
  
  


Somewhere in him, Donghyuck registers that it’s pathetic how everybody is able to pick up on each of his little crushes. Hanging upside down on the sofa, school papers in one hand and pencil between his teeth as he tries futilely over and over to educate Mark in his math -- not that Mark is bad, in any sense, he’s actually quite good -- but the  _ worst  _ part of it is that Mark will not stop teasing him about Jaemin (it was like this with Yukhei, too). And it’s not that Mark is especially adept at picking up the signals, but it’s that Donghyuck is especially bad at hiding them.

Donghyuck, with his rosebud heart encased in shimmery glass, Donghyuck with his growing and absolutely out of control crush on Na Jaemin make a perfect throwing board for Mark’s sharp edged darts, and each one strikes soundly home.

So Donghyuck, sweaty in the incoming summer heat and fighting off his growing annoyance eventually throws the papers and pencils down.

“I’m leaving,” he announces, and proceeds to march towards the door. Mark sits up from where he had been splayed out on the floor, confusion apparent in his eyes, then relaxed amusement.   


“You just don’t like hearing about Na Jaemin,” he says, smug, and Donghyuck would like to reiterate that that is definitely not the case; in fact, the one thing he likes hearing about is Na Jaemin -- but he refrains from commenting and picks up his bag from where it was strewn across the floor.

“No, I just don’t like  _ you _ ,” he shoots back, swings the doorknob of the door open and then runs childishly down the two blocks to his house like an overgrown toddler. By the time he makes it home, he’s five times more sweaty and ten times more annoyed; he throws his bags down on his bed and slams the bathroom door shut.

After he’s taken a cold shower and is considerably more calm, he comes downstairs to find Mark sitting at his dining table, an apologetic look on his face and eyes wide and round. 

“Hyuckie, I’m sorry,” he says, then holds his hands out. “Can we be friends again?”

And Donghyuck, ever the petty person that he is, sticks his nose in the air and pretends to think about it and says, “I’m sorry, Donghyuck the virtuoso.”

Mark drops to his knees and clasps his hands in front of him in prayer. “I’m sorry, Donghyuckie the virtuoso altruistic, merciful and good-hearted knight.”

“You may now stand, mere servant.”

Mark scrambles to his feet and tackles Donghyuck to the ground, clasping onto him like a leech. “Are we all good now?”

And Donghyuck, cursing his ever fragile heart and windspun will, says “Yes, yes, yes.”

  
  
  
  
  


The worst part, Donghyuck thinks, is that Jaemin is so inexplicably kind -- so kind that despite how much Donghyuck tries to build up his walls, they crumble like sandcastles in the waves oncoming from the shore. 

While they work on their maths project and munch on cookies that Donghyuck’s mother had made, Jaemin suddenly sets his pencil down, brow furrowed in confusion. Donghyuck pauses where he had been crouched over the papers, pencil poised in midair -- and Jaemin sighs.

“Donghyuck, I’m not entirely sure where the variable needs to go here. I’m so sorry, I’m holding us back --”

Donghyuck fights back the shivers that roll down his spine when Jaemin says his name, and instead scoots over to where Jaemin sits, peering over his shoulder down at the worksheet. The proximity of them makes his hands shaky with nervousness and he pulls the sleeves of his shirt down over his palms and fingers.

“Where?” His voice cracks and he clears his throat, trying again. “Where?”

Jaemin shakes his head, frustrated. “There needs to be a variable somewhere between these two equations, but I can’t figure out where exactly. Could you -- just --” And Jaemin scoots back, as if to make room for Donghyuck to take his place, but Donghyuck had been right behind Jaemin, and unprepared.

Completely taken by surprise, Jaemin’s momentum brings the both of them sprawling to the floor, Donghyuck’s limbs gracelessly tangling with Jaemin’s and heart beating furiously quickly. The plate of cookies goes down with them, crumbs bouncing across the linoleum and under the counter.

“Oh, heck --”

“I’m sorry --”

“It isn’t your fault --”

Donghyuck’s cheeks burn red, heart pounding so hard he’s sure Jaemin can feel it through the fabric of their shirts. He scrambles out of the mess, brushing stray crumbs off his shirt and helps Jaemin up.

Jaemin sits up, various crumbs present in his hair and wails in distress, “Oh my gosh Donghyuck, I’m so sorry, I’ll tell your mother it was my fault, now the floor is all messy --”

Donghyuck brings a finger to his lips, thrill running through him and adrenaline pumping through his veins.

“It wasn’t your fault,” he says, and then, “My mother won’t mind. She loves you, anyway.” 

Jaemin’s eyes go wide. “Are you sure?” And Donghyuck nods, up and down up and down, heart expanding expanding expanding. 

  
  
  
  
  


It’s dangerous, the way Donghyuck continues to fall in deeper but not register just how deep he’s gone. 

It’s dangerous, and inevitable.

  
  
  


Mark doesn’t say anything else about Jaemin, but Donghyuck doesn’t need him to. He thinks about Jaemin all the time, during dinner, while he’s brushing his teeth, doing his maths homework. Especially doing his maths homework, because maths homework will remind him of the project they did together and the project will remind him of their accident and then his heart will start pounding furiously and his cheeks will burn red. 

There’s something so inexplicable about Na Jaemin in Donghyuck’s eyes, something so alluring, like a moth to a flame, Donghyuck remains drawn in even months after their maths project is finished. Jaemin invites Donghyuck to their lunch table, and by extension, Mark as well -- and Donghyuck is about as happy as he can get. 

Even if Jaemin did invite Donghyuck to join his table, he has other friends that he knows better than Donghyuck, has known longer, likes more. And Donghyuck’s okay with it, he’s glad he can just be near Jaemin.

He ends up talking to Mark more, though.

  
  
  
  


In the summer of eighth grade, Jaemin moves to Daegu. Donghyuck doesn’t cry, but he stands at the train station for thirty minutes after his train leaves, staring into empty nothingness and feeling the wind sift through his hair. Eventually Mark comes to take him away, with a comforting arm thrown over his shoulders and forced laughter in his eyes, and the two of them walk to Mark’s house and sit outside in the driveway and decorate their yearbooks. 

Donghyuck puts extra stickers around Jaemin’s picture.

  
  
  
  
  


High school is a determination to be at the top of his class.. Somewhere, he registers that all around him people are making friendships, breaking friendships, and some part of him thinks he should be like that too. Making friends, breaking friends -- after all, someone like Donghyuck makes friends easily and keeps them for a lifetime.

Somehow, this isn’t what happens.

Somehow, going into high school, he only has Mark.

  
  
  
  
  


In junior year, Donghyuck’s mother enrolls Donghyuck into volleyball, soccer, tennis, none of which Donghyuck is particularly good at. She sends Donghyuck to art classes to improve his handwriting, ballet for his posture, and swimming for his physical health. 

He quits no less than three months in, complaining that everybody was a better artist than him, ballet was full of girls, and swimming gave him cramps.

One day, his mother squats down on the floor, tub of cabbage in front of her and an equally large tub of spice next to the cabbage. While rubbing the spices into every crevice of the cabbage, she balances her cell phone between her shoulder and ear, talking to their neighbor.

_ I sent him to vocal class,  _ comes out of the end of the receiver.  _ It taught him to speak when he was supposed to and shut up when he wasn’t. Send him to vocal class. It’ll do him good. _

And so after little deliberation, Mrs. Lee sends her son to vocal class, where Donghyuck upon entering the vast auditorium on the first day stares in awe at the plush velvet curtains and the rows and rows of chairs and the cavernous space.

The first day, Donghyuck sings. The second day, he sings. The third day, he sings.

On the fourth day, he decides he wants to sing forever.

  
  
  
  
  


There’s a boy, in vocal class. The ace, Zhong Chenle, a boy who can hit high notes with ease, a boy with the voice of an angel. 

The strangest thing is that Donghyuck doesn’t even like Chenle outside of vocal class. He finds Chenle too smart for his own good, stingy, sensitive. But when he sings, Donghyuck is sure he can see sparks fly. 

Donghyuck learns from observing Chenle, his tone, his technique, the way he holds a microphone. He learns from Chenle, and he gets better -- soon, his vocal range is developing and he’s learning how to vibrato and he’s figuring things out.

He spends so much time at the auditorium even Mark catches on and figures something isn’t normal. Donghyuck brushes off Mark’s concern when he corners Donghyuck one day, asking where he’s been. Donghyuck plasters on a smile and edges his way out from under Mark, giving a half-placed answer then dashing towards the vocal studio.

Chenle takes  _ private lessons _ , and Donghyuck rushes after school everyday in order to hear him practice. He stands outside the building with his nose pressed up against the glass of the door and peers into the fogged up windows, desperate for some auditory clue. Chenle sings like he’ll die young, and Donghyuck, with his breath fogging up the windows, can only sway with his eyes closed in awe. 

Days pass like this, with Donghyuck dodging Mark’s questions and running to the vocal studio to hear Chenle practice. 

Donghyuck catches Chenle one day leaving the vocal studio, flush high on his cheeks and fingers clutching various music books. Upon seeing Donghyuck, Chenle makes his way towards him, suspicious look on his face.

“What are you doing here? Do you have lessons with seonsaengnim too?”

Donghyuck shakes his head, waving his hands for extra emphasis. He doesn’t, but how can he tell Chenle he comes here everyday to hear him sing? The last thing he wants to come off as is nosy and creepy.

“I...I had a question for him. Seonsaengnim, I mean,” and it’s a pitiful lie but Chenle takes it all the same, suspicious look disappearing from his face.

“Well, then go ask him, I suppose,” he says, and turns around to leave.

“Wait!” Donghyuck calls after him, hands pressed to his sides and eyes darting around, landing anywhere but on Chenle’s face. “I -- I really like hearing your voice. You sing, I mean,” he says, scuffing at the ground with the toe of his shoes. “Your technique is really developed.”

Chenle’s eyes soften and he turns around so that he’s angled towards Donghyuck. “You’ll get there too, one day,” he says, thinking, and then -- “Don’t you know what they say about you?”

Donghyuck shakes his head, confused.

“They say your voice is like honey,” Chenle informs him. “You could be great if you wanted to.” He turns around and leaves, and Donghyuck stares after him mouth wide open, eyes like two full moons.

Upon returning home, he decides he’s going to be even better than Chenle.

  
  
  
  
  
  


It’s senior year and Mark comes up to him one day after school as they walk back home to their neighborhood together. He’s silent, at first, Donghyuck being the only one chattering away. There’s a moment where Donghyuck takes a breath of air, and Mark opens his mouth.

“I’m going to Seoul.”

Donghyuck pauses, mouth half open as he stares at Mark. Mark, going to Seoul? He treads to a gradual stop, feet dragging across the hot pavement. Mark won’t meet his eyes as he keeps walking resolutely. Donghyuck scrambles to catch up.

“What do you mean, you’re going to Seoul?”

Mark still refuses to look up as he keeps walking. “To study. There’s a performing arts school there that I want to get into.”

Donghyuck finally catches up to him, and he’s silent. It’s almost like he knew this would happen, that everyone would eventually leave and he’d be alone. But he’d never fathomed that Mark would leave, because Mark is a constant and constants are consistently there. Mark has his hands shoved deep into his pockets and his fringe drapes into his eyes, eyes that won’t meet Donghyuck’s. Donghyuck swallows, hard.

“Okay.”

Mark’s eyelids flit upwards, momentarily full of something unnamable, before they blank out and become monochromatic again.

“You’ll be okay?”

Donghyuck forces out a laugh, reaching out to push Mark’s shoulder.

“What do you mean, I’ll be okay. Of course I will.” He clears his throat, and this time it’s him who can’t meet Mark’s eyes. 

“Okay.”

Donghyuck clears his throat again, twisting his fingers together. “Well, then… have a nice time, I guess.”

Mark has that weird look on his face again. “Yeah, I will.” They stop at Donghyuck’s front door, and Donghyuck turns his back. Each step feels heavy, and something hard churns in his gut. When he closes the front door, he doesn’t look back.

Mark is already gone.

  
  
  
  


Senior year passes in a blur. Prom comes, and Donghyuck doesn’t want to take a girl so he hangs around the concessions stand with a cup of water in his hand and feeling uncomfortable in his dress wear. Chenle comes up to him, asking where the water is. He doesn’t have a date either.

Chenle is the first person Donghyuck tells he is gay. 

Donghyuck pushes himself back from the table and leads Chenle to the water, where as he watches Chenle fill a cup with long, slender, artists’ hands -- he suddenly blurts out, “I like you.”

Chenle continues to fill his water, only casting an annoyed look backwards. “Yeah, so? I like you too.”

Donghyuck internally groans and pinches himself for his mouth. “No, I mean I like you. Like…”

Chenle’s finished filling up his water and turns back around to stare at Donghyuck suspiciously. “Like…?”

Donghyuck registers that he’s not going to let this go, so he swallows and says, “I’m gay.”

Chenle blinks, several times, momentarily surprised -- then his features smooth over and he says again, “Yeah, so?” And Donghyuck’s mouth drops completely open at his lack of dramatic response and he feels lightheaded.

“What do you mean, ‘yeah so?’ I’m gay. I like you and I’m gay.”

Chenle shrugs and downs his water, turning back for more. “Cool. I don’t like you that way, but it’s cool with me that you’re gay.”

Donghyuck thinks he’s about to fall over. His head hurts and he thinks something’s wrong with his hearing. “Wait...you don’t care? That I’m gay, I mean.”

Chenle shrugs again and brings the cup to his lips. “You’re nice and you sing well, and no, I don’t care if you’re gay.” He pauses with the cup halfway to his lips, then says, “Should I?”

And Donghyuck feels like air is expanding inside his chest, inflating him with helium and bringing him up to the sky. 

Chenle continues, “If you like a guy, that’s fine by me. Just make sure they like you back.” He shrugs yet again. “Sorry for not liking you that way. You’re cool and all, but I don’t know if I like guys. So.”

Donghyuck feels a wide smile breaking across his face. “No, it’s fine,” he says, and it really is. 

  
  
  
  
  


Mark leaves for Seoul, and Donghyuck sees him off at the airport. There’s an interesting feeling in his gut, and he ignores it as he plasters on a smile and waves repeatedly until Mark disappears past the gates and goes out of sight. 

The drive back home is silent without their back and forth banter, and Donghyuck feels sick to his stomach for some reason he can’t place. When he gets back to his apartment, he makes sure all the doors are locked before flopping down at the kitchen table and staring unseeingly into the opposite wall.

He thinks now his heart has hardened a bit, no longer the soft thing it was years ago. He thinks that he’s grown tougher, the sun has tanned his skin, he’s lost some of his baby fat, and things are going to be okay, that he’s not going to fall any more, that he can get on with his life without experiencing nature’s misery.

But his treacherous heart, it betrays him, it betrays him again and again and again and Donghyuck falls once more. 

  
  
  
  
  
  


Without Mark, there’s no one to make late night snack runs with, no one to knock on the door asking for a spare key, no one to wake him up at night because he hogged all the covers. Without Mark, Donghyuck doesn’t have anyone -- sure, he has a couple of friends but they’re all people that he knows on the surface level.

And Donghyuck stops singing after high school despite his affinity for it, he finds that with no one to listen to him and feed him praise it’s hard to keep it up. So Donghyuck excuses himself from vocal class and tells his mother he doesn’t want his vocal chords ruined and it’s not like he was going to be great or anything. She takes it all in, already planning her next endeavor for her son. 

Donghyuck makes it into one of the most prestigious universities in his hometown, and his mother is ecstatic upon receiving the letter -- but Donghyuck looks at it dully and wishes Mark were here with him just so he wouldn’t have to go alone. It’s childish of him, to be afraid to go to university without somebody to accompany him -- but Mark’s been with him so long his absence is like a gaping hole.

He’ll live, he reasons to himself. He doesn’t need Mark.

  
  
  
  
  
  


Donghyuck meets Jeno at a university party, holding a cup of lukewarm beer and staring at it in distaste. Donghyuck sidles up to him, uncomfortable in the heat of the room and with sweaty bodies pressing against him on all sides, yells, “Parties not your thing?” and Jeno turns towards him, giving an eye smile not unlike Yukhei’s before saying  _ they don’t look like yours either. _

Donghyuck winces before replying. He’s never been the partying type, but in order to broaden his social circles he had decided to attend a sophomore party down the street. It hadn’t been far, and anyways, exams had just passed. He had free time.

“I guess they’re not.”

Jeno sets down his cup of beer on the floor and extends a hand outwards. “Do you want to get some fresh air?”

Donghyuck nods gratefully and follows Jeno out the door, inhaling deep breaths of fresh night air before turning to Jeno. “I’m Donghyuck, by the way,” he says, shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his jacket. It had been warm inside the house, but with November steadily approaching it was well below sixty degrees outside. 

Jeno’s eyes crinkle again. “Jeno Lee.” He slumps against a tree tiredly, yawning.

“Who dragged you here?”

Donghyuck feels himself flush. He raises his chin. “I dragged myself.” Jeno looks at him in surprise.

“I didn’t think you’d be someone who would intentionally subject yourself to torture.”

Donghyuck groans, passing his hand over his face. “I’m too antisocial, I guess,” he says, even though it isn’t true. As a child, he had been the most social person on the block, but these days he finds himself withdrawing back into a shell of studies and late night ramyeon breaks. He tells Jeno this. 

Jeno nods, as if this was a familiar scene. “Which convenience store?”

Donghyuck gestures vaguely in the general northern direction. “The one past the university by like four blocks.” He shrugs. “Not too far. Manageable.”

Jeno’s eyes brighten. “We should go there together sometime,” he says, and Donghyuck feels an inkling of anticipation. Perhaps the night wouldn’t be wasted. 

“We...could go there now,” he offers hopefully, and Jeno’s eyes brighten even more.

That’s how they find themselves sitting outside on the benches with soggy paper cups of Shin ramyeon bunched between cold fingers, chopsticks in other hand and steam fogging up the glass of Jeno’s wire frames. 

When they both finish, Jeno stacks both of their cups neatly on top of each other and collects their chopsticks, standing up to throw them into the trash can. Donghyuck swings his legs and watches Jeno walk to the trash can and back, and when he sits down again Donghyuck opens his mouth, pointing in the general direction.

“I’m guessing you go to that university?”

Jeno nods, cupping his fingers in front of his mouth and blowing warm air onto them. “Yeah. You?”

Donghyuck gives an affirmative. “What brought you to the party tonight?”

Jeno wrinkles his nose, shaking his head. “My idiot friend pulled me over, saying I have no social life and need to get out more. And --” he ducks his head “-- get laid.” His cheeks flush despite the cold.

Donghyuck feels embarrassment creep up his spine, heating the back of his shirt. “Well...I don’t see what the big deal is,” he mutters, “I’ve never gotten laid before.”

Jeno looks up at him with wide eyes. “You -- you’ve never?”

Donghyuck shrugs, embarrassment making its way to his ears and his face. It’s true he’s never had sex; he never had the time for it among his studies and most importantly, never had an interest. But despite not having an interest, he feels excluded from the rest of the general student population, never having had such an experience.

So Donghyuck just ducks his head and mumbles, “No,” and they sit in awkward silence until Jeno breaks it tentatively.

“I mean, I could…? If you want?”

Donghyuck’s entire face flushes, on fire. He’s not that desperate, not so desperate that he needs someone to offer their body to him in order for him to feel like he belongs. He opens his mouth, about to refuse --

And Jeno hurriedly amends himself, saying, “That’s not what I meant,” he says quickly. “I mean --” He blushes. “You’re cute and everything and I’m just saying I’m here for you even though we kind of just met and for all you know I could be a serial killer and oh god this is not going the way I want it to --”

Donghyuck feels a small grin spread over his face, and he stops Jeno’s rambling with a finger to his lips. “Nah, I know what you mean,” he says, and starts laughing.

Jeno looks at him, mortified, before realizing Donghyuck wasn’t laughing at him for ill reason. He joins in, laughing as well, and so Donghyuck’s first time is Jeno Lee, laying back down on Jeno’s bed and gritting his teeth desperately so as not to be heard through the thin walls of Jeno’s apartment. Jeno is soft, loving, careful, aware it’s Donghyuck’s first time and afterwards he kisses him sweetly and holds him tight.

  
  
  
  
  


It’s difficult not to fall in love with someone like Jeno, Donghyuck soon realizes. They start dating soon after, and Jeno is the type of person who will spring up behind Donghyuck when walking to classes and slip an arm around his shoulders and press his lips to his cheek. Jeno is there, whenever Donghyuck needs him, and more importantly, Jeno needs Donghyuck too so that Donghyuck isn’t just some parasite living off of Jeno, it’s a symbiotic relationship in the positives; mutualism.

They live in separate apartments still but visit each other’s housing quarters often, spending nights over and waking up to one or the other preparing coffee or cooking breakfast. It’s beautiful, and too good to last. Donghyuck should have known it was too good to last.

  
  
  
  


Donghyuck is just stepping out of the public library when he crashes into another body, warm and solid. He steps back, disoriented, and stares straight into the face of Na Jaemin. It’s Na Jaemin, unmistakably, and years have done nothing to change the beauty of him. He still takes Donghyuck’s breath away, and he can feel his heartbeat start to pick up when Jaemin opens his mouth, shocked, and says -- 

“Donghyuck?”

And so Donghyuck invites Jaemin out for coffee. He learns Jaemin transferred to their university mid-sophomore year, and is now in his junior year -- similar to Donghyuck and Jeno. Jaemin moved back from Daegu when he started university because he wanted to attend university here, and after all these years, he still remembers Donghyuck, and by extension, Mark.

“How is Mark doing, by the way?”

Donghyuck’s face falls, and the last thing he wants to do is talk about Mark right now. “Mark moved to Seoul,” he says briskly. “Something about a performing arts school or whatnot,” and that’s the end of that conversation. 

Donghyuck introduces Jeno to Jaemin, and for a while, the three of them click together like nothing before. Donghyuck provides to be the bridge between the two, although soon, they don’t need him to play the role anymore. 

Donghyuck thinks the universe has been especially cruel to him lately, especially cruel to play a joke on him like this. It hurts him to see that there’s somebody someone wants more than him, it’s not out of vanity but out of a desire to be wanted, to be loved by someone, anyone. Donghyuck’s always been physically affectionate, relying on touch to get his emotions across and be able to iterate what he needs to say. And for him, Jeno was able to be his outlet, and he was able to be Jeno’s safety valve -- it was a codependency. But now, now, he doesn’t know what he should believe or shouldn’t believe anymore. 

And Donghyuck doesn’t want to pin all the blame on Jeno, because somehow deep inside of him he understands what it's like to want someone so much you would do anything to have them. He understands it, but doesn’t know how or why he understands it, just that he does. Jeno is not a bad person, and Donghyuck could never bring himself to hate him, even after the way he left his world in shambles. He tries to convince himself it’ll be okay, because Jeno’s going to be the last. He can feel it deep in his bones, yellow calcium and crumbling marrow. 

Jeno and Jaemin become close, much closer than Donghyuck would have expected. He should have foreseen this, should have foreseen it was going to result in pain.

Because it isn’t long before Jeno is pulling Donghyuck into an empty classroom, sorrowfully apologetic look on his face. “Donghyuck.”

And Donghyuck, being intelligent and well-versed that he is -- he knows what’s coming.

“Jeno.”

And Jeno catches hold of Donghyuck’s hands and looks into his eyes and says, “I’m sorry,” and Donghyuck says, “I know.”

Jeno says, “I really had a good time. I really did.”

Donghyuck braces himself, but nothing prepares him for the way all the air whooshes out of his lungs when Jeno says that he doesn’t think this will work. And Donghyuck blinks back the tears building in the back of his throat and asks, “Is it Jaemin?” And Jeno nods, hands cold in Donghyuck’s, and Donghyuck says, “I’m glad you found somebody you love more,” and Jeno says, “I’m so sorry.”

Donghyuck gently untangles their hands, his heart shattering into a million pieces. “It’s fine,” he says, even though it’s not fine, because he had once liked Jaemin and now loved Jeno but Jeno and Jaemin loved each other and it’s not fine and his heart is breaking breaking breaking. 

He’s the first one to walk out of the classroom. 

Like so many years ago with Mark, he doesn’t look back.

  
  
  
  
  


Mark starts dating Mina in Donghyuck’s senior year of university. Donghyuck knows this because suddenly Mark’s social media is full of posts of him and a girl and there are tags that proclaim both of their names together. Donghyuck tries without success to stop himself from bookmarking Mark’s social media page, and every time he opens it, some unexplainable feeling crawls up his throat and  _ sits there,  _ maddeningly, and no matter how much water Donghyuck drinks it won’t go away. 

He convinces himself it has nothing to do with him and throws his phone on the sofa beside him, refusing to pick it up. The weird feeling stays though, and he finds that the longer he goes without opening Mark’s social media the less intense the feeling is.

So he just doesn’t look at Mark’s social media. 

  
  
  
  
  


Somebody moves into the flat next to Donghyuck’s, and the first time Donghyuck sees him he thinks  _ wow what a lovely neighbor.  _ He’s small, sharp faced, pretty, but Donghyuck throws caution to the wind -- he remains wary. He’s not going to fall, he refuses to fall -- just because his neighbor is pretty doesn’t allude to more heartbreak.

But then the neighbor shows up at Donghyuck’s door with homemade tiramisu and a card thanking Donghyuck for being his neighbor, and Donghyuck is completely sold.

The boy’s name is Renjun, and he may just be the sharpest person Donghyuck’s ever met. Renjun invites Donghyuck over for breakfast, and it’s just the two of them sitting at Renjun’s small dining table eating scrambled eggs without salt because Renjun is a health freak and is conscious of his blood pressure. 

They make small talk for a while before Renjun hits Donghyuck up with a different type of question. 

“So, you live alone?”

Donghyuck nods, mouth full of eggs. He swallows and says, “Yeah, I guess. You look like you don’t live with anybody either.”

Renjun narrows his eyes. “I don’t, but I’d think somebody who looks like you would have a partner.”

Donghyuck flinches, pushing back from his plate. Jeno flashes across the back of his eyes, and he tries to ignore the way he suddenly feels as if he wants to throw up. “Sorry, I think I’m done here,” he says, and makes his way to the door to take his jacket and his house keys and Renjun says softly, “Wait.”

So Donghyuck pauses mid step with one arm through his jacket sleeve and the other hand clutching his keys. Renjun pushes back from the table as well, walking close enough to Donghyuck that he can see Renjun’s individual eyelashes. 

“I’m sorry,” Renjun says softly, and then envelops Donghyuck into his arms. Donghyuck remains stiff at first, rigid, before he sags into Renjun’s grip and begins to cry, ugly, full out bawling that gets snot onto Renjun’s red sweater. 

Later, they sit on Renjun’s sofa and flip through the channels of Renjun’s TV, seeing but not seeing. Renjun scoots closer to Donghyuck and puts a hand on his shoulder.

“If I may ask,” he begins, tentatively, “who was it?”

And this time Donghyuck doesn’t think of Yukhei, or Jaemin, or Chenle, or even Jeno. 

The face that makes its appearance in Donghyuck’s mind is Mark Lee.

Tears well up in his eyes again, and he’s crying into Renjun’s shoulder  _ I don’t know I don’t know _ and Renjun holds him to his chest and pats his back and says  _ It’s going to be okay it’s going to be okay it’s going to be okay. _

  
  
  
  
  


Renjun is the one who fills the gaping hole Mark left in Donghyuck’s life, and it’s mornings together with saltless scrambled eggs and whole wheat toast that Donghyuck and Renjun bond. Renjun came from China, moving to Korea at a young age in order to study there and Donghyuck can’t be more grateful to have Renjun in his life. 

One thing Donghyuck is sure of, though, is that although Renjun fills the hole that Mark left, he is not a replacement. His edges aren’t smooth enough and he lacks years and years of experience with Donghyuck. Even after Donghyuck graduates from university, Renjun in tow, Renjun and him learn to skitter around each other, banging, clashing, crashing, but never falling. Donghyuck thinks that under any circumstance, he would have met and become friends with Renjun because they are that similar to each other, both sharp tongued, smart, surprising loners in society.

Donghyuck also knows that although he came to love Renjun, he never loved him romantically. Renjun was easy to love, and Donghyuck may have fallen for him before -- but after Jeno, Donghyuck doubts he could fall for anyone else (but then why does Mark --). No, what he feels for Renjun is almost even deeper than romantic love, a brotherly confession, a joining of two souls. 

Renjun is there all the time, whether it be hanging outside his apartment after university with a cup of carrot juice ready and a mouthful of gossip to spill, or cold nights together in Donghyuck’s living room banging frustratedly on the cranky old air conditioning box. Contrary to the expected, Donghyuck doesn’t find his presence annoying at all and would like to think that Renjun feels the same. 

Christmas comes and goes and they spend it with just the two of them, sitting on the sofa and flipping through channels and wrinkling their noses to the bad Christmas music. Renjun buys the both of them red and green ugly sweaters and Donghyuck wears his even though it’s scratchy and made of bad material and cheap. They don’t eat traditional holiday foods because Renjun argues that holiday foods are overpriced and overrated, so they cup their bowls of low sodium ramen between their cold hands and laugh together. They don’t even need a camera to commit these pictures to memory, and Donghyuck thinks it’s the happiest he’s been in a long time. 

  
  
  
  
  


Sitting again on Renjun’s sofa, a year later, Renjun asks if he’s ready to talk about it.  _ Talk about what,  _ Donghyuck feigns, and Renjun rolls his eyes and slaps Donghyuck’s thigh and says  _ talk about the boy you loved.  _

Donghyuck sobers up after that and stares at the floor for a long while, before saying softly, “He was my best friend.”

Renjun is silent, and then -- “Was?”

Donghyuck shakes his head. “I don’t know what we are now. I mean, he’s dating a girl in Seoul, what am I supposed to think.”

Renjun is silent again. “Do you love him?” he finally asks. 

And Donghyuck has to think about it, because does he love him? It doesn’t feel like what happened with Yukhei, or the physical attraction he felt towards Jaemin, or the deep emotional attachment he had towards Jeno, or the brotherly love he feels towards Renjun. It’s something different, something only fourteen years of companionship can forge. Something… 

In the end he just sighs and says, “I don’t know, Renjun. I really don’t know,” and Renjun nods like he’d expected that answer. He goes into the kitchen and brings out a bottle of wine and pours Donghyuck and himself a glass, raises it, and toasts both of them.

“To love,” he says, then drinks deeply. 

Donghyuck frowns, glass in hand. “You’ve never told me about yourself.”    


Renjun chokes, spit flying onto Donghyuck’s face. “What about myself.”

Donghyuck mimic’s Renjun’s tone. “ _ Love _ . You know.”

Renjun eyes Donghyuck warily, clutching the glass to his chest like a shield. “What do you want to know?”

Donghyuck shrugs. What  _ does _ he want to know? “Anything,” he says. “Why you understand me.”

Renjun wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and sets his cup down carefully. He stares unseeingly into the walls for five minutes before saying, “You don’t know if you love him. But I did, I loved him.”

And then, softer, “Very much.”

Donghyuck reaches out and pulls Renjun towards him so that they’re collapsed onto each other on the sofa. “I’m sorry,” he says, and Renjun pulls out from his grip with an annoyed look on his face. 

“Why are you apologizing? You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Donghyuck slaps him playfully, brow furrowing “I’m empathizing, not apologizing. Get it right.”

Renjun’s expression falls, becoming something more wistful. “I thought you could replace him, you know? When I first met you. You’re like him, in some ways. But as I got to know you, it was… kind of that feeling. That feeling that I could never feel something romantic for you because you’re just not him, you know what I mean?”

And Donghyuck does, he gets it completely. “But you can’t replace him,” he whispers. “You never will be able to.”

Renjun closes his eyes. “I know.”

Donghyuck reaches out for him again, pulling Renjun back. “How do you deal with it?” He pleads. “Does it get better?”

And Renjun smiles a little, soft. “With time, Donghyuck. With time.”

  
  
  
  
  


Donghyuck finishes university and decides he wants to move to Seoul to look for a job. It’s hard, breaking away from Renjun after all these years together, and as he sits at his desk and writes Renjun a letter the ink of the page is marred by his tears. They blur his vision and stick his eyelashes together, and he doesn’t make any attempt to wipe them away because after all these years if there’s one thing he’s learned is that he’s going to have to live with pain and make the best of it wherever he goes. He seals up the letter by licking up the envelope and doesn’t tell Renjun where he’s going. 

He tells his mother he’s out to experience the big city life, away from this university town and out into the real world. His mother is all too pleased with his decision, long having pushed Donghyuck to his limits and sure Donghyuck was destined for something greater. 

So Donghyuck packs his bags and slips the letter under Renjun’s door and buys a ticket from the booth in the train station. The train ride is quiet, and there are only two other people in his compartment. It’s January and when Donghyuck steps out of his compartment and into the Seoul city night, he can see his breath -- it forms a transparent cloud that he can see the stars through. He’s even surprised there are stars at all, thinking that Seoul would have been chock full of pollution. 

He throws his scarf over his shoulder and drags his suitcase to the bus station, taking a bus to his apartment complex. He fumbles with the key once or twice before it finally jiggles into the slot, and he has to grope around in the dark before he finds the light switch. It’s a nice apartment, good enough for one person to live in. It’s all he needs, anyway.

  
  
  
  
  


Days pass in a flurry of hurriedness. Donghyuck gets a side job at the local cafe and flips out of bed every morning with a speed that wouldn’t have been possible before meeting Renjun (he pushes Renjun out of his mind because it’s too painful to think of him) and grabs a mug of instant coffee because despite his job at the coffee shop, he prefers not to waste is money on expensive fancy coffee when espresso powder does the trick for him. 

He walks briskly down the frost laden sidewalk and even though he’s running late, he stops to help an old lady with her groceries cross the street. When he finally makes it into the coffee shop, his boss sends him a dirty look which Donghyuck ignores. He shucks off his coat and immediately goes over to the espresso grinder, cleaning it thoroughly inside and out.

As he takes orders, it starts to snow outside. It snows in soft white flakes, just dusting the ground so that when walked in it leaves footprints, but not enough to start a snowball fight. The bell rings behind him, and accustomed to the sound, Donghyuck doesn’t look until a large hand claps him on his shoulder and Donghyuck nearly buckles under its force.

“Donghyuck! Remember me?”

And Donghyuck turns around and meets Wong Yukhei in the flesh, winter coat and snow dusted boots and everything. His mouth drops open and the pen and order book falls out of his hands and he springs onto Yukhei, clinging to him like a giant koala. 

Yukhei laughs and picks Donghyuck up, spinning him around in the middle of the cafe. They garner some weird looks but other than that, the people mind their own business. Donghyuck finds himself immensely glad his boss is currently in the kitchen.

“Yukhei! How have you been?”

Yukhei flashes Donghyuck a blinding smile. “Can I get a coffee?”

And so that’s how Donghyuck and Yukhei end up sitting at a small round table in the cafe, Yukhei with a latte in front of him and Donghyuck with a cup of water. 

“Now.” Donghyuck scoots his chair in and clasps his fingers under his chin, resting his head on the interlaced digits. “Spill  _ everything _ .”

Yukhei stayed in Jeju until his university time, when he moved to Busan to study. After his studies, like Donghyuck, he decided to move to Seoul to look for business opportunities. He’s been living in the apartment complex three blocks away from Donghyuck’s, and he stopped by the little cafe today in order to buy a cake for his friend’s birthday.

Donghyuck picks up his glass of water and takes a drink. “I could give you a discount,” he offers. “I’ll pay for it with some of my tip money and nobody will notice anything.”

Yukhei looks horrified. “Oh no, Donghyuck, I couldn’t ask you to do that. But --” Here he leans closer, as if he’s about to tell Donghyuck a secret -- “how have  _ you _ been?”

Donghyuck freezes with the water cup halfway to his lips. He lowers it slowly back to the table, and brings his hands underneath the table, where they twist together. “I’ve been alright,” he says finally, nodding. “I’ve learned a lot.” He sighs deeply.

Yukhei leans closer, a concerned look on his face. “You know, after all these years Mark and I have kept in touch. He’ll be ecstatic to learn you’ve come to Seoul --”

Donghyuck knocks his water cup over. It spills into his lap unflatteringly and the plastic bounces off the plaster of the floor, and Donghyuck curses. He doesn’t even bother to pick it up before he’s standing up, eyes wide. “You know where Mark is?”

And Yukhei nods enthusiastically. “He graduated from that university he always used to talk about, and he’s now working to produce some of his own music. Do you want his number?”

Donghyuck’s eyes go even wider. He wants it, he wants it more than he’s ever wanted something before. But at the same time, he knows the implications of receiving Mark’s number, the implications of meeting Mark again. The implications of -- 

“No,” he says loudly, and several people pause in their conversations to look at him. Donghyuck ducks his head down in embarrassment and says quieter, “No.”

Yukhei looks at him in confusion. “You don’t want his number? Why not?”

Donghyuck hides his hands underneath the table again. They tremble in private. “Yukhei” he whispers, “I think I… nevermind.”

Yukhei still looks confused, but he shrugs instead. “That’s alright. Also, Donghyuck… there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.” He takes a deep breath. “Remember Chenle?”

At Donghyuck’s hesitant nod, Yukhei plows onward. “He… he told me what you told him.” When Donghyuck waits patiently for clarification, Yukhei continues. “He… he told me you were gay.”

Donghyuck feels understanding shadow his face, and makes an effort to school is features into a neutral expression. “And?”

Here Yukhei looks up, something shining in his eyes. “And I couldn’t help thinking you were the bravest person I knew.”

Donghyuck reels back, shocked. Yukhei reaches for Donghyuck’s hands, and Donghyuck lets him grasp them underneath the table. “I only figured it out three years ago, but I’m gay too. Even if I didn’t know at the time, I thought you were the bravest person I knew. For telling him that.”

And Donghyuck wants to say that he wasn’t brave, he wasn’t brave at all, he was just a stupid teenage confessing a stupid crush to another teenager who happened to be a boy and some things just slipped out that way. But he never gets the chance to tell Yukhei this because Yukhei finishes his cup of coffee and grabs his coat, standing up to hug Donghyuck. 

“Stay well,” he says, and then marches purposefully outside the door. The little bell on the handle rings cheerfully, and Donghyuck still sits at the round table in shocked silence. 

He hadn’t known Mark was still in Seoul, if he did it would have been likely he wouldn’t have chosen Seoul. He hasn’t checked Mark’s social media in two years, either, so he wouldn’t know Mark’s current status. But learning from Yukhei that Mark was here, still in Seoul, after university even…

It’s enough so that Donghyuck cancels his shift early with a promise to his boss to make it up later. He runs back to his apartment, forfeiting the bus and dashes up the flights of stairs until he can jam the key repeatedly into the door until it budges open. Breathless, he throws his jacket and scarf on the couch before opening up his phone and -- yes, Mark’s social media is still bookmarked even after all these years. Donghyuck taps the little icon with trembling fingers and pulls up the account.

_ Location: Seoul _

_ Status: active nine hours ago. _

Donghyuck lets out a breath and slumps against the armrest of the sofa, phone falling out of hand.

So Mark really is still in Seoul. Mark is in Seoul and Donghyuck misses him more than ever, longs to see him. He thinks back to the conversation he and Yukhei had earlier. 

_ Even if I didn’t know at the time, I thought you were the bravest person I ever met. _

And Donghyuck decides, right then and there. The next time he sees Mark, he will tell him.  
  
  
  


Sunday morning, Donghyuck rolls out of bed to snow all over his windowsill and what has to be at least six inches of fluff lining the parking lot of the apartment complex. He makes his bed and cooks eggs (saltless) and puts bread in the toaster (whole wheat) and perches on the kitchen counter with a plate in his hand, fork in the other. When he’s finished, he dumps the plates into the sink (he’ll do the dishes later) and is just about to head upstairs to vacuum when the doorbell rings.

Puzzled, Donghyuck goes to the door and looks out the little glass eyehole and lo and behold, Mark Lee stands outside his crappy apartment door. Donghyuck wrenches the door open faster than he’s ever done in his life, and Mark stands awkwardly with a sheepish grin on his face.

“Surprise?”

Donghyuck tackles Mark to the ground in a hug, and the two grown men roll around on the stone like a bunch of little children. When Donghyuck has composed himself, he pulls Mark into his apartment and shuts the door.

“How did you even get my address?” He demands.

Mark rubs the back of his neck, ears red. “Yukhei told me,” he admits. He moves to take off his jacket, but Donghyuck stops him imperiously. 

“Well, now that you’re here,” he declares, “We have to go out.” Donghyuck grabs his jacket and his scarf and struggles with the door for another two minutes before Mark joins in to help him, and together they’re able to get the door open. Donghyuck pulls Mark down the flights of stairs and into the street, where it’s begun to snow again. He sticks his tongue out and lets the flakes land, melting within a second of contact. 

Mark grins at him. “You haven’t changed much at all, huh?” And Donghyuck almost says  _ I’ve changed too much _ before he bites back the words and smiles back.

“Let’s go to the bookstore,” he says, and he falls back slightly so Mark can take the lead. Watching Mark’s figure walk down the street, Donghyuck’s heart feels so raw it aches.

_ I’ll tell him. I’ll tell him later.  _

  
  
  
  
  


They decide to stop at Donghyuck’s cafe for lunch, and they sit at the same table Donghyuck and Yukhei sat at. 

Donghyuck gets a proper coffee for once, and as they dig in Donghyuck talks around his mouthful of food.

“How’s Mina?”

And Mark freezes, mouth in mid-process of chewing before he swallows slowly. “We broke up.”

Donghyuck stares at him. “After… three years?”

Mark nods, a little sadly. “I figured it wouldn’t work, because I was using our relationship to distract myself.” He shakes his head, as if to rid his mind of thoughts. “But it’s not a big deal anymore, Donghyuck. It never would have worked out in the end.”

And Donghyuck says, “Shit, Mark, I’m really sorry,” and Mark just shrugs, taking another bite.

“Like I said, a distraction. Couldn’t have lasted.” He’s quiet for a moment before he says, “But what about you, Donghyuck?” He wriggles his eyebrows. “You’ve grown up.”

And Donghyuck thinks about it, he thinks about first Yukhei, then Jaemin, the Chenle. Jeno, Renjun. And finally, his mind circles back to Mark before he says, “I’m happy where I am,” and he leans down to take another bite. He misses the way Mark’s eyes cloud over with something he can’t place. 

_ I’m happy, just like this. _

_ I don’t have to tell him.  _

Mark hesitates. “Actually, Donghyuck, I didn’t come here just to visit.” He stares at the ground. “I needed to tell you something.” 

So Donghyuck waits for Mark to compose himself, and Mark says -- 

“You’ve just always been there for me, you know? Like, we’ve known each other for how long now? Fifteen or sixteen years? And throughout those years we’ve had our ups and downs but we always manage to get back on track.”

Donghyuck doesn’t know where he’s going with this and Mark isn’t looking at him.

“I just wanted to say that you’ve always been there for me. It’s almost like you’re a part of me, and when I left for a while I couldn’t breathe because a part of myself was gone and I kept waiting for you to call or something but you never did. And all those years ago, you let go so easily I just thought that, well, you didn’t care the same way I did.”

Mark still isn’t looking at him.

“So I found Mina and she was looking for a relationship and I needed a relationship and I thought she could be that for me but I had to break it off in the end, you know? Because it just wasn’t right, it was like I was using her to cure my own heartache or something. But it doesn’t matter anymore, because when you keep something built up in your chest for so long it’s gonna explode if you don’t let it out.” 

He takes a breath.

“So, this is me exploding, Donghyuck. Sixteen years worth of everything. Exploding.”

He finally looks up.

“And I know you don’t feel the same way but I just had to get it out, Donghyuck, I had to -- it was starting to physically hurt, you know? And I’m so sorry I have to say it like this, I’m so sorry --”

Up until this point, Donghyuck has had his hands tightly folded in his lap, but now he interrupts Mark mid sentence, shocked. “I don’t feel the same way?”

Mark stops, a confused look on his face. “You do?”

And Donghyuck understands, he finally understands. He stands up, walks around the table to Mark and stands directly in front of him, hands braced on his shoulders.

“Mark. I never called because I was afraid.” __

“I was afraid to face what I was feeling. I was afraid it made me weak, that I was unworthy, that I had fucked up colossally for the rest of eternity and didn’t deserve to find somebody.”

“I was afraid to admit that I was feeling this way about you and I didn’t think you felt the same. That feeling, the one you described, the one where you couldn’t breathe. Mark, it was like that for me, too -- I was dying little by little, every single day. I never checked your social media after finding out that you were dating Mina, because she’s better for you than I could ever be in any way and I was happy that you found someone you could depend on. I let you go so easily all those years ago because I was afraid to name what was going on, afraid to confront emotions, afraid to let myself have what I wanted to have.”

“But now --” Donghyuck grits his teeth. “Now I get it. Even if I get it, I still might not let myself have what I want to have. Because I don’t deserve it. Because deep down, I’m despicable and doomed. Because there will never be anyone for me like you.”

Mark’s eyes are shining. “I’m not dating her anymore,” he breathes. “I’m not dating Mina anymore.”

Donghyuck lets out a breath. “I know,” he whispers, “Mark, I --”

But he’s silenced as Mark surges upwards to capture Donghyuck’s lips in his own, warm, chapped lips with traces of coffee on them and tasting sweet. Donghyuck clutches to Mark desperately, shoulders up, hands twisted all tangly into the nape of Mark’s hair. Nevermind that they’re in the middle of Donghyuck’s cafe, they rock together, Mark’s hands on Donghyuck’s hips.

When they break apart, Donghyuck’s cheeks are flushed and Mark‘s ears and red. 

“Take this somewhere else?” He offers, and Donghyuck grins back at him.

“Let’s.”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


_ Donghyuck reaches out for him again, pulling Renjun back. “How do you deal with it?” He pleads. “Does it get better?” _

_ And Renjun smiles a little, soft. “With time, Donghyuck. With time.” _

  
  
  
  
  
  


_ Seven years later _

  
  
  
  
  
  


Renjun screams when he sees the ring on Donghyuck’s finger. 

“Who confessed to who?” He demands, eyes darting from Mark’s face to Donghyuck’s.

Mark ducks his head, embarrassed. “I did,” he says, and Renjun squeals and starts hitting Mark repeatedly. 

“Oh my god, I can’t believe this is actually happening,” he says, jumping up and down. “I  _ actually  _ cannot believe this is happening.”

Donghyuck feels shy for one of the rare times in his life, and he sidles over to Mark to lace his fingers through his. 

“It’s not like you couldn’t have seen it coming,” he mutters, embarrassed. “Seven years, Renjun. Seven long years.”

Renjun rolls his eyes. “I know, I know,” he says, “But half of us always wondered why you two were taking it so slow. Like, you’re obsessed with each other. It was bound to happen sooner or later.”

Donghyuck shrugs. He doesn’t say,  _ I wanted to be sure. I wanted to be sure it was going to last.  _

_ I wanted to be sure I was worth it.  _

Instead he says, “Our parents would have freaked if we rushed things. And besides, I think seven years passed by relatively quickly.” He side eyes Mark. “Don’t you think?”

And Mark just squeezes their interlaced hands together and smiles. 

Donghyuck thinks he’s learned a lot in his twenty eight years of life. How to love, how to lose. He knows it's been painful, years of hurt that can’t be washed away the way water laps at sand. There’s some humiliating moments in his history that he’d prefer to keep buried down, deep deep down in his consciousness. But he also knows that those years he spent chasing after people and looking for love weren’t wasted -- here he is now.

Walking down the isle is perhaps one of the most difficult things he’s ever done, to give in and just trust. Trust that Mark will hold his hand, trust that Mark will be there to catch him when he falls, because it isn’t a question of if he’ll fall but rather when. But it’s not just difficult; it’s also a joy. A joy to stand at the altar with tears blurring his vision so that he can’t see and the crowd below him is just a sea of dots turned upwards, a joy to face Mark like this and hold his hands and say the words  _ I do.  _ And all these thoughts pass Donghyuck’s mind in the millisecond it takes for them to look at each other, and Donghyuck just knows with a certainty in his gut that he’s going to be okay.  
  
  


_ Mark. _

  
  


_ My brother. _

  
  


_ My love. _

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for being here. It's been a while since I last posted, and I can say that the months have been hard. This fic was inspired by so many people's experiences that I thought were just too beautiful to let the lessons go, and I wanted to give life back to those experiences and re-live the lessons through Mark and Donghyuck, because love is imperfect and messy and incomplete, and loving someone is painful because you open yourself up to be vulnerable. Through people I've learned a lot about love despite not having very many experiences of it myself, so I hope I was able to portray the heartache and beauty of it accurately.
> 
> I wrote this in my favorite style, and for how short it is it took a surprisingly long time to complete because I wasn't sure what I wanted to do here. Sometimes picking up the pen is the most difficult step, after putting it down for a long time. 
> 
> Thank you H, because without your inspiration and encouragement this would not be here. Thank you to all the readers who are taking time out of their day to sit down and read my drabbles. Without you, I wouldn't be where I am today.


End file.
